


Crawling Across the Great Divide

by ishie



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Demons, Alternate Universe - Magic, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Witchcraft, Crossroads Demon Rey, F/M, Soft Boi Witch Ben, of course Maz would run a small town grocery store
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-01
Updated: 2019-01-01
Packaged: 2019-09-25 23:30:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,447
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17130749
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ishie/pseuds/ishie
Summary: Trying to manifest an impossible wish was, frankly, a ridiculous way to spend a Friday night. Even for Ben Solo.





	Crawling Across the Great Divide

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Hormonal_Trashbag](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hormonal_Trashbag/gifts).



> Hormonal_Trashbag, thank you so much for the opportunity to smash together two of my favorite tropes and wind up with this somehow ♥
> 
> All my love to my beta and cheerleader, who for whatever reason never talks me down from using weird old classic folk/rock lyrics as titles. (This one's from The Band.)

Trying to manifest an impossible wish was, frankly, a ridiculous way to spend a Friday night. Even for Ben Solo.

He emptied his basket onto the conveyor belt, pretending a deep fascination with the odd assortment of items as he laid them down: a leaky tray of steak, frozen dinners, a single can of cat food, three weedy stalks of rosemary, two candles—cinnamon-scented; not his favorite, but the closest available color to what he needed—and a jumbo stick of deodorant. 

The biggest upside of moving home? The cozy apartment above the only market that stayed open past sundown, even in the summer. Extremely handy when he routinely forgot to do things like "keep the fridge stocked" and "check to make sure he had what a certain spell required _before_ starting."

So he was a little out of practice at a lot of things these days.

"Big night, huh?" The cashier's smirk was audible.

Sure, there were downsides, too. Namely, coming back to the same town his family had been all but running for generations. Sometimes it felt like he couldn't do so much as fart without hitting the front page of the _Reflector_. Print and online.

With a sigh, Ben finally gave up on the pipe dream of discretion and made eye contact. "Just picking up a few things, Maz."

"Thought you'd be out with the brides and groom tonight." She waved a frozen pizza over the scanner. "They're going all out, I hear. Snap was in here begging for anything he could throw in the deep fryer."

"I already did my part." A long weekend of lugging Jess and Rose's things out of their places and into Finn's, to be exact. His back was still complaining, hence the single use heating pad Maz was tucking into one of his reusable bags. No way was he up for a crawl through what passed for an entertainment district in their small town. 

Maz hummed, apparently unconvinced. At least she let it drop. "That'll be thirty-two even, kiddo, since you're rounding up to donate to the children's home."

"Am I?"

"Thirty-five? So generous!" Handing back his change with a wink, she added, "For that, I won't tell your dad what you're up to."

Ben's ears burned. As if the old man couldn't guess, after the ultimatum he'd dropped on Ben that morning. How many options were left open to him?

He swung the bag with the steak through the air next to him, as if that would help make his point. "I'm— It's for— I'm cooking dinner."

"I'll make sure the fire department's at the ready, then."

"Good _night_ , Maz."

Her laugh followed him out to the sidewalk and into the stairs up to his apartment. So did the sound of her tapping on her phone. If Han wasn't knocking on his door within two hours, it would be a miracle.

Upstairs, Ben rushed through his meal, shoveling half a cardboard pizza into his mouth while answering email on his phone and double-checking the ebook he'd had open for most of the week.

_Summoning, Manifestation, & You_

He'd even paid for the damn thing rather than try to find it in the town library, where he knew Holdo had at least three copies—and a direct line to the Organa residence.

"I can't believe you're doing this," he muttered to his reflection in the kitchen window. "Just tell him to take a hike."

His reflection stared back, half-cocked smirk making the resemblance to Han more pointed than usual.

"Jackass."

Ben wasn't sure which of them he meant.

The kitchen filled with the smell of warm cinnamon when Ben lit the candles. A little too quickly, he thought, crushing one of the rosemary twigs until its clean scent managed to cut through the spice a bit. He cracked the window open for good measure.

It took only minutes to finish assembling the rest of the required ingredients and tools. The spiral inscription on the silver bowl gleamed under the incandescent lights. It was pitted here and there with the remnants of sixty years of Skywalker enthusiasm. When the blood from the steaks covered the bottom of the bowl, Ben added the rosemary, a few bits of mashed liver from the can of cat food, and a healthy portion of the water he'd purified during the full moon. A sprinkling of ash from his last bonfire, a handful of salt from the Nabooian coast, and a splinter pulled from the door at the wedding venue finished off the physical requirements.

Steeling himself, Ben dipped two fingers into the nauseating mixture and smeared them across his forehead before setting the bowl down between the two candles. He checked his phone again, then passed his hand over the twin flames. Into the twisting ribbons of smoke he spoke his intentions. 

The once-familiar burn of new magic sparked under his skin. It itched, the way it had when he'd first started casting. Igniting new pathways, maybe, or prising open long-neglected ones. Charm work didn't feel like this anymore.

Closing his eyes, he visualized the tight coil of the spell expanding to arrow away from him into the universe. With a few tweaks to the wording, and that splinter from the venue where his friends would be married, he'd tried to limit the spread of the spell to town. To the small circle of people he knew and hadn't already built charms for. With any luck, that would keep the reverberations down. If he were really lucky, it would go no farther than the smallest possible group who might be available to help him without reservations. There was no benefit to be gained from his intentions landing on someone who had to be compelled to step in. Even less from accidentally ensnaring the last person he could ever turn to for this.

No matter how much he wanted exactly that.

He skimmed the twelve lines. Heart opened, burdens lightened, obligations met; yeah, that was everything.

Ben tried not to rush through the words, but the higher the magic ramped up under his skin, the more his adrenaline spiked. He stumbled over a phrase. He should have taken the time to smooth out his alterations more. What had once been second nature felt clumsy and awkward, like trying to walk in the wrong size shoes.

Reaching the second to last line, he fished out a single blade of rosemary and ripped it in half. The candles sputtered as he held the pieces in their flames.

The hair on the back of his neck stood straight up when he muttered the last of the incantation.

"Absit invidia verbo."

At least, that was what he was supposed to say. He'd barely reached the last syllable of the phrase when someone pounded on the back door of the apartment. All the tension of the spell dissipated in an instant, rushing away like a receding tide and taking both the candle flames and the kitchen lights with it.

"Fuck!" Ben stomped over, flicking on the exterior light out of habit and unlocking the door without looking outside. "Dad, I told you, I don't want your—"

His embarrassingly petulant whine ground to a halt when he realized who was on the other side of the screen door.

"You're not Dad."

The woman standing on his tiny porch-slash-balcony smiled, dimples popping in her cheeks. "No."

Ben tried to come up with something else to say, but his brain refused to cooperate.

Rey. Here. _Dimples._

Her smile widened, eyes crinkling further at the corners and shiny white teeth nearly glowing. She lifted a hand and waved. The tiny wiggle of her fingers slammed straight into his chest and set his heart to fluttering in the same rhythm.

"Doing okay there, Ben?"

"Yeah," he answered, automatically. "Fine."

Of course he was fine. He'd maybe never been better, actually, now that he was looking at her again. It was kind of all he wanted to do, for the rest of his life, to look at her smiling so brightly at him with her sweet mouth and her soft skin and her loving gaze.

Except it wasn't so much loving as it was—

"Got a little bit of schmutz on your forehead there. You aren't cooking, are you?"

Right. Mocking. That was what Rey did when they were face to face. All the other stuff was in his head. ( _In his heart,_ his stupid brain whispered.)

He pushed his dumb tender feelings back into the thick box where he kept them and slammed the lid shut. Metaphorically. In reality, Ben pushed through the screen door to stand with her on the porch. He swiped a hand across his forehead, remembering too late that he shouldn't until the spell was complete. _Fuck._

They both looked at the congealed reddish-brown sludge on the back of his hand.

Rey sniffed, her face wrinkling up around her nose. "Beef? And... Did you get a cat?"

"Maz doesn't carry fresh liver." That didn't really explain anything, but how was he supposed to think of anything else to say when her hand was reaching out for his, only to stop midway and drop to her side again.

"Ah." She smiled again, slower this time and not even half as sunny. "I should let you get back to it, then."

But Rey didn't turn to go. Neither did Ben. Instead he leaned back against the door and tried to surreptitiously wipe his hand clean on his jeans. She didn't miss it, of course. She never missed much. Just the big obvious things.

And speaking of... "Did my dad call you?"

"Han? No." She chewed her lip briefly, sending a white-hot curl through Ben's belly.

It couldn't have been Maz. She knew enough to be an asset to the community but had no abilities herself. She also knew better than to wait in desperation beside a crossroads under a new moon.

"What are you doing here?"

"What are you summoning?" Rey blurted over his question. A light flush rose up her neck and face but she kept her eyes trained on his. 

"Summoning? Why would you—"

She waved her hand again, like she wasn't sure what else to do with it. "The, uh, schmutz. I could smell the blood from downstairs but then there was all this cinnamon, and I got worried maybe you were trying to bake something."

Ben had to clutch the door handle behind him when she leaned in and sniffed him again. A shiver ran through her before she pulled away.

An answering shiver rushed through him, lifting the hair on his arms and neck.

"I mean, there's rosemary, too, yeah? For clarity. The blood by itself could be anything but I have to warn you it really doesn't do much for the complexion."

He tried not to think about how she knew what blood did for the complexion. Hers was so smooth and golden, dotted with freckles, that he had always had trouble reconciling it with the rest of who she was. What she did. Who ever heard of a demon with such smooth skin and a fresh face?

"Sorry!" she barked, her skin turning even rosier. She rushed on before he could come up with a half-decent lie. "God, sorry, you're busy. It's none of my business. And you're busy! I said that already. I should go."

She hadn't taken more than a step away, toward the stairs down to the parking lot, when Ben's mouth ground back into gear. His brain was still stuck firmly in neutral, unfortunately, which meant there was nothing left to stop the words from tumbling out.

"No! You should come in. I was about to fry up a couple of steaks," he blurted. His over-full stomach lurched. But, she still ate, didn't she? "For dinner. You could eat one? I mean, do you want to get some?" He coughed and wiped a bead of sweat off his forehead. "Some steak, I mean. Get some steak. Ha!"

_Fuck._

"You really shouldn't-" 

__

Invite her into his new home, where she'd never been before, as if nothing could come of it? He swallowed down the agreement trying to bubble out through his lips. 

__

"I shouldn't cook unsupervised, I know. But the steaks are just sitting here..." Because he'd never meant to eat them. And he'd already eaten enough pizza to make him feel vaguely sick to his stomach, even without the liver soaking into his pores and the near-hangover from touching live magic again. But Rey was here, _here_ , almost close enough to touch, and he wasn't strong enough to pretend he could watch her walk away yet again.

__

"Please, Rey."

__

Her voice was soft when she agreed, almost quiet enough to be lost in the buzzsaw of cicadas and the faint sounds of people going about their lives that drifted up to them from the yards below. Ben pressed a fist against his abdomen to keep the wild burst of joy from fighting its way out.

__

"Good." He fumbled for the door and pushed it wide so she could duck beneath his arm to step inside. "Thank you."

__

Rey snorted. "That's a first, someone thanking me for showing up unexpectedly at their door."

__

It wasn't, really. It was just the first time he'd said it aloud.

__

She hovered near the table while he rushed ahead of her. The kitchen light hadn't come back on yet but there was more than enough illumination spilling in through the door and windows to show what he'd been doing. Ben shoved the silver bowl into the sink and ran a quick blast of water over it. The candles were snuffed but he covered them with their fitted lids anyway, which did almost nothing to stifle the cloying scent of cinnamon.

__

Flipping on the exhaust fan over the stove, he tried to remember how to breathe. "Just the steak okay? I kind of forgot to get any vegetables. There might be a bag of broccoli in the freezer but it's probably mostly ice by now."

__

"Just the steak is great," Rey said.

__

He couldn't stop his head from nodding, nor his mouth from letting out a stream of too-enthusiastic _right_ s and _good_ s and _great_ s. Rey's smile returned and she crossed her arms behind her back with a little stretch.

__

"Anything I can do?"

__

She could cook? With a start, Ben realized he was staring at her with a single steak hanging loosely from one hand. "No, I've got it."

__

One-handed, he rummaged under the oven for a pan big enough to fit both steaks. Finding the right knob for the burner took longer than it should have, especially with her practically looking over his shoulder.

__

He dumped the steaks in the cold pan and tried to lean casually against the counter. The silence stretched on and on, broken only by the occasional sounds of the pan heating up. His mind was a blank and dusty expanse, empty of everything but all the questions he couldn't ask.

__

_Oh, but you_ could _ask,_ a voice that sounded far too much like Han rumbled in his head.

__

Rey was chewing her lip again. Nibbling, really.

__

Ben's brain shorted out again but he managed to ask, "What?"

__

"Aren't you going to, you know?" She wiggled her fingers at the stove.

__

He winced at the memory of the last time she'd seen him try to hurry along a meal. Another ridiculous attempt to impress her, as if she hadn't seen so deeply inside of him that it was unlikely to work.

__

"No, learned that lesson finally. No more goosing the mundane." After a moment, he added, "I haven't actually done any magic in ages. Just fitting charms since I got home, really."

__

He hoped she would understand what he meant but all she said was: "Oh." Her eyes flitted up to his then down to the pan again. "Do you mind if I try something?"

__

"Sure, go ahead. Mi casa, ah—" He ground to a halt as heat swept up his neck. _It's all yours,_ he wanted to say. Meant it, too. But he couldn't. "Go ahead," he repeated.

__

He stepped out of her way as she approached the stove. That brief moment when she'd ducked under his arm had been enough to get the smell of her in his nose, cinnamon be damned. She smelled sweet and warm, like sun-gilded lilies, with a hint of smoke and the tang of fresh sweat underlying it all. She always did, since the night they'd met. Of course, the smoke had overwhelmed the rest at first. That, or the shock had done it. Or maybe that was how he'd chosen to remember, insulating his want with the reality of who they were.

__

His anger and confusion had melted away quickly that night. So fast it made him dizzy. _She_ made him dizzy. While she carefully read out the terms of their contract, Ben had wanted to bury his nose in the the curve of her neck, taste the salt of her skin on his lips and tongue. He still did. 

__

Shaking his head, he focused on what she was doing. She'd been in the fridge, evidenced by the fat knob of butter she was dropping into the pan. With a questioning look over her shoulder, she picked up the remaining rosemary and threw that in, too. Nudging the temperature higher, she rocked the pan onto one side and dipped a spoon into the puddle of butter, using it to baste the meat as it sizzled and popped.

__

Ben couldn't help but move in closer. "Where'd you learn to do that?"

__

Her turn to wince. Her golden cheek paled a bit.

__

"Sorry," he told her. "You don't have to tell me." 

__

He already knew, didn't he? The same way she knew that rosemary was for clarity and blood was more than a binding seal. She'd plucked that from his head, her slender fingers picking and choosing, unerringly reaching for the most valuable, the most sacred.

__

"That's the problem," she said lowly. "I want to."

__

She let the pan drop back onto the stovetop and tapped the spoon on the rim before laying it on a towel he didn't remember her getting out of the drawer. Turning the burner down and the oven up, she slung the door open and whisked the pan into the warming interior. Bent double for a moment, she peered in and fiddled with the placement of the pan while Ben tried not to stare at her ass.

__

When she straightened to face him, Ben's breath caught in his chest. She'd dropped the sunny expression, the happy grin, even the pensive look he'd caught a few times. There were shadows under her eyes he hadn't noticed before. Little blue thumbprints that revealed the exhaustion her skin had hidden.

__

For the first time, he also realized that her hair was down. No more of those twisty little buns, no sections drawn back to set off her ears and the delicate curve of her neck. Instead it hung loose around her shoulders, longer than he'd seen it before, with a hint of a wave at the ends. The part atop her head looked darker than usual. Maybe even a bit greasy.

__

"Rey, what's wrong?"

__

This time when she bit her lip, it was hard enough to pale the flesh from the pressure. Her eyes brimmed with tears that she dashed away quickly.

__

Ben closed the distance between them and cupped his hands over her shoulders. "Tell me," he pleaded, bending his knees enough to bring them to almost the same height. "What can I do?"

__

"I can't ask that of you."

__

Once, that might have been true, when Rey held his contract in her hand. But he'd long since won it back, with her help. All she held now was his poor dumb heart, the one that refused to hear her protests or his own.

__

She crossed her arms over her chest to lean into him, reaching up to curve her hands over his own. His lips brushed against her hair, lightly enough that she might not recognize it for the kiss it was.

__

"What spell were you casting tonight?" she whispered into his shirt.

__

Her voice was so thick with tears that Ben felt his own throat close up. It was difficult to get any words out at all, even the right ones. He'd spent so long choking his words back. Knowing they would spill all of him at her feet when he did. Not even daring to whisper them in the dark quiet of his lonely bed.

__

"One I wrote," he told her. "Sort of. A manifestation spell."

__

"What were you manifesting?"

__

Impossibilities, he wanted to tell her. Someone who would make his father happy but never himself. Someone close, someone imaginary, with no strings, no expectations. Someone who would understand what he was and what he couldn't be. Who could handle the pressures that rose alongside him: how Han couldn't believe a no, even when you screamed it in his face, and Leia could never stop giving them even when she didn't mean to. How his heart contracted whenever he saw how another of his charms worked out. How lonely it was to be suffused with the kind of magic that identified and enabled true lovers but was powerless to help him claim his own.

__

But he couldn't tell her any of that.

__

"It doesn't matter," he said. "I don't think it would have worked even if I'd finished casting it."

__

She hummed. "Then I don't think I'm sorry to have interrupted."

__

"What's wrong?" he asked again in the pause after his wry snort. The back of her head fitted easily into the palm of his hand. "What can I do?"

__

Rey laughed, a little, wet and messy. She squeezed the hand still under her own and stroked his skin with her thumb, as if she couldn't bear to not move. "You've already done your part," she said, echoing what he'd told Maz a lifetime ago now. "The next bit's all mine."

__

She stepped back, out of his embrace. Grabbing the towel off the counter, she swiped it over her eyes and sniffled generously.

__

"Why are you here, Rey? _How_ are you here? The last time I saw you, you said—"

__

"I did, didn't I?" Her voice was fainter now, like she'd already ended the conversation. She fiddled with the towel, avoiding his gaze and looking around the room. "This is a nice apartment. Quiet. I can barely hear the street from here."

__

Wasn't that why he'd picked it? A busy front street, but no side streets or alleys. No sidewalks cutting through what passed for a backyard. Only the small parking lot to the east and a half-dozen mismatched fences dividing the block.

__

"I walked," she told him with a hint of a smile. "Haven't done much of that in a long time."

__

"You walked," he repeated. His head felt hollow, empty. Lighter than air, like it would go floating up into the sky if it weren't for the rest of his body tethering it down.

__

Rey rubbed the side of her finger against her lips and the sleeve of her shirt rode up, just an inch. Just enough to reveal the charred skin that radiated up from her wrist. Her unchained wrist.

__

Seeing that he had noticed, she grinned suddenly, all teeth and gums.

__

"I came to tell you I might not be able to make the wedding." Her shoulders lifted in a shrug but the rest of her was coiled tightly, ready to spring. Away from him or back into his arms, Ben couldn't decide. "I'll be there if I can. I want to be there. Finn's been so kind, and Rose is wonderful about everything, but I have to— I think I found a way out."

__

Ben shoved a loose fist against his abdomen again, right over the scar she'd pushed into his flesh, to hold in another sharp burst of joy fizzing against his ribs.

__

"A way out of Unkar's?" he asked.

__

She jerked her head back, lips pressed tight to keep from answering, but her face was bright with triumph. "It means I have to go away for a bit."

__

Ben had to put his hands deep into his pockets to keep from reaching for her again. He didn't know whether he wanted to hold her in place so she couldn't leave or shake her until she gave him a straight answer.

__

"Where?"

__

Her nose wrinkled. "Not sure yet. I need to find something first. Something important. Everything kind of hinges on it."

__

Whatever it was, if Ben didn't have it, he would find it for her. Whatever it took, no matter what it cost. Hadn't she done the same for him? 

__

_Isn't she still?_ that Han voice whispered in his ear.

__

But Ben didn't know how to make the offer. So, instead, he stood there like an idiot, hands clenched in his pockets, shoulders hunched up around his ears, trying not to do his own crying. Not while she was there, anyway.

__

"Will you be back?"

__

His voice cracked on the last word and her eyes flared as red as the sun sinking below the trees outside.

__

"Yes," she hissed. "Nothing will keep me away."

__

Ben took a deep breath and asked, for the third time, rushing the words out before she realized, "What can I do?"

__

Rey softened. There was no other word for it. The redness fled her eyes, all that coiled tension melting away until she was left standing before him as tender as a new baby. She took one wobbly step toward him and pulled his hands free, clutching them in her own. She kissed the backs of his hands, the knuckles, where his skin had blistered and cracked and broken.

__

"I can't ask that of you, Ben. You've already done enough," she repeated. The words rang through him like a bell, her truth in every syllable. He hadn't needed to ask again. She'd told him already.

__

"I can do more."

__

"I know, but I won't risk you. Not again."

__

He broke free of her hold and cupped her face between his hands. "I'll wait for you at the wedding," he promised. "I'll save you the first dance. Even if I have to lock my dad in the cry room to do it."

__

She laughed, like he hoped, and nodded. "What if I asked you to save them all for me?"

__

"Done," he said, leaning in to kiss her before she'd finished. "Everything I have was already yours."

__


End file.
